


Kaleidoscope

by eilishlove



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Everyone loves Louis that is really all you need to know, Grew up together AU, Louis' sister and dad get a mention but only sort of, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-22
Updated: 2014-08-22
Packaged: 2018-02-14 06:46:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2181948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eilishlove/pseuds/eilishlove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>But Harry can see the way his eyes keep sliding over other peoples faces like he can't bear to look at them and see the pity. When he feels a hand slipping into his under the table he doesn't let on, and when Jay corners him in the laundry and asks how Louis is doing, he mumbles through an 'Okay, alright, fine,' before escaping like a frightened mouse. He hates lying to Jay, she's like a second mum. But he knows Lou, and he knows that he doesn't want people to know how broken he is. Except Harry. Harry isn't people, it seems.</p><p>-</p><p>'To be is to be perceived. And so to know thyself is only possible through the eyes of the other.' - Cloud Atlas</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kaleidoscope

**Author's Note:**

> The world may not revolve around Louis Tomlinson, but this story certainly does. You have been warned.
> 
> (Also, yeah, I know that my writing is highly stylized, this fic is super jumpy for it’s length and hasn’t been beta-ed or britpicked. If you’re not enjoying yourself, quit while you’re ahead.)
> 
> -
> 
> Disclaimer: While this story is loosely based on the public personas of One Direction members and their families, it is in no way meant to imply anything about the true personal lives of those people.

The week after Louis' Dad leaves, Harry spends so much time wrapped up in Louis that he starts to forget where the line between them lies. And it's so stark, because Louis won't let anyone else touch him. He rolls his eyes and tells everyone he's fine and it's not a big deal and would they just leave him alone already?

But Harry can see the way his eyes keep sliding over other peoples faces like he can't bear to look at them and see the pity. When he feels a hand slipping into his under the table he doesn't let on, and when Jay corners him in the laundry and asks how Louis is doing, he mumbles through an 'Okay, alright, fine,' before escaping like a frightened mouse. He hates lying to Jay, she's like a second mum. But he knows Lou, and he knows that he doesn't want people to know how broken he is. Except Harry. Harry isn't people, it seems.

It's a few weeks later that Harry realises how bad it is. He's not sleeping in Louis bed anymore, and he thinks things are looking up, but then he walks over for dinner and opens the door to a house full of meaningful glances and heavy silences. The air feels charged and thick like a storm brewing.

Dinner is weirdly quiet without Louis laughing and chattering like normal. Harry picks up what he can but it feels like lifting a roll of carpet from only one end. What is normally cheerful banter is sagging sideways, leaving something else behind in its place. 

Harry is halfway through a rambling story about a particularly mad customer at work when Jay reaches over the table to touch Louis arm and ask in a low tone if he's alright. Harry stumbles in his story as Louis jerks back.

'Don't touch me.' His voice is like cold steel. 

Harry picks back up with his story, watching carefully across the table as Lou stares down at his plate. His sister is giving Harry wide eyed glances from his left, and as Harry's story winds down into silence he glances up and sees Jay crumbling into herself, tears sliding down her face. His voice comes to an abrupt stop, and the silence lasts for a heartbeat before Louis’ chair is scraping rudely across the floor and he's stalking out of the room.

Harry hesitates for a moment as Jay loses the last of her composure, wonders if he should stay and comfort her. But there isn't much he can think of to say, not when he knows that if he goes upstairs it'll be seconds before Louis buries himself in Harrys arms. Guilt and sorrow pour through him as he rises silently and leaves mother and daughter to comfort one another.

Despite everything, despite the fact that Louis has never hesitated to find his way into Harry's embrace, he has a moment of doubt standing on the threshold of Louis room. He hesitates, and then he steps towards Lou and offers his open arms. It's an invitation, of sorts. An offer that doesn't need to be accepted. It's Louis’ chance to say no.

He doesn't. He simply lurches forward into Harry's arms, sinking into him in a way that Harry doesn't fully understand. And for a split second he feels guilty that he is the one Louis is embracing. 

 

\--

 

His head is spiny, he'll admit. But putting that aside, Liam isn't actually that drunk. Probably. But it's okay, it really is. Nothing is going wrong at all, and anyway Louis is far drunker than him. Liam can tell, because he knows Louis, and he knows that when Louis gets to the really drunk part of drunk, he waxes poetic. And right now he's starting in on the colour of the couch they are sitting on, and all Liam is doing, can do, is giggle.

'I've never in my entire life seen a couch this blue. Can you see this, Li? It's bluest bluey blue. Like, whatsit called, cool bolt blue or whatever it is.' 

Liam just smiles at him, drunk (alright, he'll admit it, but he's not very drunk he swears) and amiable. The room they are in, some room in some house at some party or other, is filled with all these people, but of all of them Liam can only notice Louis. 

Louis, and the blue bloody couch.

'Its a nice blue,' he offers.

This, it appears, is completely hysterically funny to Louis. Liam laughs at Louis laughing, and they end up giggling and gasping like two red faced idiots on a couch. Well, not just like. They really are two red faced idiots on a couch, Liam thinks.

As their laughter subsides, they lean back into the couch and each other, and Liam has to admit he is happy pressed into Louis warm side, eyes glazed and limbs slack. At least until Louis wriggles, and his elbow digs into Liam's gut. 

But he doesn't care, not really, even though he swears and wriggles away. 

 

\--

 

The thing is that Harry was skeptical of Liam from the first day Louis dragged him through the lunchroom to sit with Harry, Zayn and Niall, seemingly against Liam's will. In Harry's book, anyone who had to be coerced into spending time with his friends should at the very least be treated with extreme caution.

In Liam's defence, he had been won round in less than ten minutes, but still. Harry has just never been as close to Liam as Louis is. 

He totally gets it, is the thing. Louis is just this like, magnetic force, and Harry understands how easy it is to get sucked into his orbit, he really does. It's just that Harry doesn't have much, if anything, in common with Liam.

Before Liam, they didn't go to house parties. And if they did, Harry would be the one curled up on the couch with Louis while Niall partied with total strangers and Zayn practiced his pout in the corner. 

It's probably not about Liam. More likely its about the fact that until recently, Harry and Louis were inseparable, two peas in a pod, the kind of best friends where you didn't say one name without immediately following it with the other. And now, ever since Liam sat down at their table, it feels like that closeness is slipping away, slow as a glacier and yet too fast to hold on all at the same time.

That isn't Liam's fault. Nobody is to blame, it’s just something that happens, or at least that is what his mother thinks. Harry isn’t so sure, thinks it probably isn't normal to simply drift away from the one person you know better than you know yourself.

 

\--

 

Niall likes to laugh, is the thing. And he doesn't know anyone more invested in making people laugh than Louis Tomlinson. Its like his life's work is in gaining the laughter of others, even when it makes him look stupid. Especially when it makes him look stupid, perhaps.

They started watching a movie earlier, some crappy romance thing that Harry probably picked, or maybe Zayn, and Niall was bored out of his mind and halfway asleep until Louis returned from the kitchen with a full cup and squashed himself into the sliver of space next to Niall with the kind of shit eating grin that always precedes the best kind of trouble.

'Lets play a drinking game,' was what he proceeded to whisper.

'What're we drinking,' Niall questioned, always serious about alcohol.

'I may have poured myself a cup of vodka,' murmured Louis, tipping the cup towards Niall with a smirk. Niall smothered down the rising desire to laugh.

'Aright then, rules?'

'Drink whenever someone says something sappy or the blonde girl changes outfits,' Louis whispered. 'And a double for bad kissing or sex,'

Niall gave a nod, and Louis answered with a quirk of his eyebrow. Let the games begin.

By the end of the movie, Zayn is in all-out disapproving mode, and Niall is struggling to catch his breath through his laughter. Louis is still making snide remarks in his ear and pressing him to take a drink while the main characters kiss on screen.

'Good god, she looks like she's trying to eat the first layer of his face. Or at least coat it in her saliva.'

And maybe it's that Niall is half of the way to drunk right then, or that Louis has this pleased look on his face, like every time he makes Niall laugh it's a personal achievement, but at that moment Niall thinks Louis might be the funniest person he knows. And also probably the best.

 

\--

 

They used to touch all the time. Harry remembers. Can't even begin to forget. They used to fit so well, spend all this time wrapped up in each other's arms. 

He misses it, misses the comfort and the understanding. Misses Louis being right there, all the time. It's not like they don't see each other anymore, they hang out all the time. Harry would know.

It's like his brain has this secret ability to be constantly aware of Louis all the time. They'll be over at Zayn's place watching a movie, and Harry won't be able to concentrate for the whole thing, his entire brain devoted to Louis giggling with Niall at the far end of the couch. He can't help it.

'I just don't even know what I did wrong, like, because, it must've been something,' he tells Nick sadly one evening when he's had a few drinks, and Nick just murmurs in sympathy.

'I miss him.' It must be the hundredth time he's said those three words to Nick, but he doesn't say so, doesn't do anything but card a hand through Harry's curls and then offer to paint his fingernails. 

It's only when Harry's left five nails are not-so-carefully painted sunshine yellow that Nick replies.

'He misses you too, Haz.'

Harry doesn't know how Nick could possibly know that, he and Louis have never been mates. But Nick is old and wise, no matter how he hates when Harry tell him so, and it's what Harry needs to hear.

 

\--

 

Objectively, Zayn knows that Louis doesn't tell him everything. But it's easy to forget, when they have been sitting around for ages, the slow buzz of a high leaking slowly away as they talk, and talk. Or rather, Louis talks, and Zayn listens.

'I'm not sure I even believe in love. Like, in the fairytale sense with a happy ending where you ride off into the sunset. Just seems so unlikely, y'know? That two people could fall for each other at the exact same time and, like, get it right. Not fuck it up.'

Zayn turns his gaze to Louis' face and finds his eyes.

'I don't think it's impossible. Love, that is,' he tells Louis.

'Even though it's never worked out yet?' Louis asks, meeting his eyes. Zayn swallows, and then nods.

'Cause, like, it wouldn't be love if it wasn't hard.' Louis smiles at that, but it's less happy and more bitter.

'If it's so hard, is it even worth it?' Zayn knows that Louis wants him to think he doesn't care, knows that he's trying so hard to make this sarcastic and flippant and a big fat joke. 

He shifts on the couch, wriggling closer so that his chin is touching Louis' shoulder. 

'Its worth it.' He murmurs. 

Louis snorts, but all Zayn sees is how scared his eyes look.

There's something that Zayn is missing from the equation, something that Louis hasn't told him. He's so close to asking, the question sitting right on his tongue, but Louis must see it coming, because before Zayn can open his mouth, Louis is sitting up, mumbling about needing a piss.

Zayn flops back on the couch and sighs. Louis has been like this, full of this kind of scattered energy, for months. It's to do with Harry, a blind man could see that much, and he's beginning to piece together the rest of it. Louis can't keep running forever, he thinks. Although knowing the boy, he could probably run a long time, especially when what he’s running from means as much as Zayn is certain this does.

 

\--

 

Harry knows that it’s bad when Liam notices. Liam is always the last to notice, so Niall is probably worried too and he knows Zayn knows and it just seems like the only person who thinks nothings wrong is Louis.

‘Are you and Lou okay, Haz?’ Liam asks him, crowded into the corner of the sticky booth they are all sharing. 

He hesitates, because it's Liam asking, and then tells him the truth. ‘I’m honestly not sure.’

‘You don’t seem okay. You seem sad, and Louis does too.’ Liam tells him.

Harry snorts quietly. If Louis is sad then he’s doing a pretty great job at hiding it. 

Liam doesn’t force the conversation, just jumps up and offers to get them drinks. Several times, in fact. Which is why, by the time they are all leaving, Harry is a right mess. Messy doesn’t really explain why he loops his arm around Louis’ neck and pushes his nose into his hair, though.

‘Are we okay, Lou?’ he mumbles.

Louis’ voice is tight as he replies, ‘Yeah, we’re fine Harry.’ 

Harry doesn’t believe him. Not when he disentangles Harry from his side instead of smiling and leaning in. It is in that moment that Harry realises how bad things are.

It is in that moment that he really, finally understands what its like to be pushed away by the one person who matters most.

 

\--

 

It is easy, when we are living our lives, to forget that we aren't the only ones. It's was something she learnt, when she became a mother, Jay thinks. There's nothing that humbles you more than having a child, looking after a little screaming writhing thing and knowing that one day he will be a person, with feelings. 

Jay has been there for Louis' whole life, the only one who has. But if she had to pick a second, it would be Harry. She won't ever forget the first time she saw them together, stood at the fence to the school, watching distractedly as children poured from classrooms in a tide of noise and mess. 

It was a cold day, winter term winding down into holidays, and the excitement in the air left a buzz on her lips. It's only because she was watching that she saw at all, watched as, out of the crowd of children, one pale face turned skyward. 

'Look,' Harry was saying, 'Look at the snow!'

Pale flakes floated towards a pale upturned face, now joined by others, attention caught by the scattering of snowflakes. And Jay watched as Harry turned and caught her son by the wrist, holding out a small palm, and several rapidly melting snowflakes. 

It's funny, because Jay doesn't remember Louis' face, just Harry's smile, and the shine in his eyes, wide and honest. After that day, it hadn't taken long for Harry to appear in her doorway, and even less for him to become a permanent fixture in their lives, an extra place set at the dinner table and a spare mattress squashed in next to Louis' bed. 

And then there came a time when Jay was watching Harry and Louis' sitting curled up on sofa together and realised that Harry has wormed closer to Louis' heart than even her. She thinks back to her own friendships, her best friend of high school and the girls in her share house at uni, and she wonders if she's been missing something this whole time. Or if Louis and Harry are just luckier than most.

 

\--

 

By the third ring, he's about ready to hang up the call. She picks up on the fourth.

'Harry?' She sounds hesitant, and he wonders what she knows that is turning her voice into something that hurts. 

'Jay,' he mumbles, and then she's sighing into the phone, her voice slipping into something more familiar.

'Oh honey, are you alright?' She sounds concerned and motherly, and it's pretty much all Harry can do to keep it together right now.

'I was just wondering, just hoping that you, I mean,' he pauses and takes a breath. 'Have you talked to Louis? Recently? Because he hasn't really, uh, been really talking to me, I guess. Or no, he has but I'm just not...' He trails off and then swallows. His last words are barely more than a whisper. 'Did I do something?'

A long pause follows his question, just a long moment where all he can hear is the faint noise of Jay breathing.

'You didn't. Oh Harry, you didn't do anything wrong,' she tells him, and she sounds so very sad. 'Louis is just, well. You know how he can be. He pushes people away, you know that.'

Harry does know that, he does, but it's just. Well it's just that this is the first time it's been him being pushed away. He doesn't say it out loud, but Jay seems to hear it anyway, in his silence.

'I know, honey. He's just, scared right now and all you can do is just don't let him push you away, okay?'

Harry wishes he could scream at her that she doesn't know, can't know. Except she probably does know, better than almost anyone, he thinks. That doesn't make it hurt any less, though.

'Okay,' he replies.

 

\--

 

Louis turns up at Harry’s house on a rainy friday, water dripping down past his bare ankles and this look on his face that Harry can’t even begin to think about. All he can process is that Louis is here. Louis is at his house.

‘Can I come in?’ Louis asks, in a tone of voice that suggests he thinks the answer might be no.

And Harry’s heart just breaks, then and there. 

He gets Louis inside, toweled off and into a new shirt all without either of them really saying anything. Well, they say things, but nothing that matters. Nothing about Louis turning up on Harry’s doorstep unannounced after pushing him away for months on end. None of that.

So when there is nothing more to do, and Harry is sitting on his bed and Louis is nervously playing with his fringe in the doorway, the silence seems to ache with all the things they aren't saying. 

‘Harry,’ Louis starts. Harry looks up and meets his eyes. ‘I am so sorry.’ 

‘Me too,’ Harry murmurs, but that isn’t the right thing to say, it seems, because Louis is frowning at him.

‘What are you sorry for, Haz?’ Louis demands, and Harry shrugs. 

‘Whatever it is I did that made you, y’know, whatever.’ Louis’ frown deepens.

‘You didn’t do anything, Harry. It was all me, okay. I was being stupid and you, god, you are always so good to me. I don’t even deserve it.’

‘You deserve it,’ Harry tells him, because its true. Louis chokes out a laugh.

Harry opens his mouth to repeat it, to keep telling him until he believes it, but Louis interrupts before he can begin.

‘I’m in love with you, Harry.’ 

His words hit Harry like a slap to his face, his mouth still open but no idea what to say. And Louis is just standing there, his eyes lowered to his sockless feet, and Harry is just. Harry is just so in love.

And then he is standing up and crossing the room, and Louis is lifting his head and opening his mouth to start saying something, but Harry doesn't stop, just fits his arms around Louis’ neck and presses their mouths together.

They kiss the same way they have always done everything, almost chokingly close, Harry’s entire body pressed up against Louis. And not for the first time, Harry wonders at how well they fit together, how natural it feels to sink into each other like they’ve never been apart.

The kiss breaks when they both need air, but they stay pressed close, foreheads touching. Harry smiles and turns to murmur in Louis’ ear.

‘I love you too.’

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you liked it, please let me know. 
> 
> I can be found on tumblr at inexplicablyhalo.tumblr.com


End file.
